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Ling.Nut
14:11, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
At Zyxoas's request I'm copying relevant portions of a discussion we were having on my talk page to here. — mark ✎ 16:40, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
Let me try this 1 more time. What's you view, exactly? That:
If you follow the first view then the article should be at Basotho, since this is the most common name used when talking about the history of Lesotho, South Africa, and Great Britain; both here on Wikipedia ( Lesotho, Moshoeshoe I) and in books I've read (eg Google for "Hill of Destiny") and TV programs I've seen etc. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 10:26, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
There was no general consensus among editors that Basotho should've been moved to Sotho people, nor was there a need to implement "standardisation" as Wikipedia has survived thus far without there ever being a need to "standardise" any article names since that would mean changing the generally accepted names -- contrary to popular opinion.
This should have been discussed first, and I believe that had it been then there would not have been a move.
This is unnecessary and misinformed and should be undone. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 17:47, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
There's no reason to indiscriminately remove prefixes. Simon's argument that one needs to know the entire language to use names with prefixes is completely false -- and I believe that I've convincingly demonstrated this. One doesn't need to understand the grammar and morphology of various foreign words to use them (and, in the case of French, even pronounce them using vowels, consonants, pronunciations which don't exist/make sense in English).
Basotho is a VERY common name, and the initial move was unnecessary and misinformed and should be undone. Had this been discussed before, I believe that the move wouldn't have been agreed upon, and it's strange that I now have to try so hard to get this simple mistake corrected. The fact that the article has already been moved does not magically give the pro-"Sotho people" arguments any more weight and validity than they would've had before. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 08:51, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
The typical English speaker need only type in " Sotho" where they'll be taken to a dab linking to Sesotho language and Basotho (no, the fact that Zulu etc redirect to the language is not really a good reason for not making Sotho a dab).
Of course, none of us here (with one possibly exception) qualifies as "a typical English speaker"... Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Maasai and Kinyarwanda language are two accepted exceptions to the prefix-less view. I wonder what the "typical English speaker" thinks of that... Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:44, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Of course, none of us here (with one possibly exception) qualifies as "a typical English speaker"... Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Maasai and Kinyarwanda language are two accepted exceptions to the prefix-less view. I wonder what the "typical English speaker" thinks of that... Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:44, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
I've sort of dealt with a similar issue at Talk:Ubuntu and Talk:Ubuntu (ideology). This is intended to (eventually, someday, perhaps) be an encyclopedia of World knowledge, not simply a reflection of the naturally limited knowledge of first language speakers of English.
So Ubuntu is a dab linking to both the ideology and the the Linux distribution, even though 1 out of every 137,85 people typing in "Ubuntu" would be looking info on the O.S.
There was nothing profoundly incorrect with the previous situation where the article was @ Basotho, and the move should be undone. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 17:27, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
I used that example to show that we probably sometimes shouldn't give so much weight to what this fabled "typical English speaker" may or may not be thinking. Also, the sensoo why I offered the counterexamples with Kinyarwanda etc is to show that the "this is what every other article is like" argument is not awfully valid.
Does anyone still believe Simon's "prefixes are evil" argument? Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 20:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Of course, in my last comment "sensoo" should've been "reason", and 1 person would be looking for the ideology, not the O.S. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 21:35, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Can I suggest the title Basotho (the Sotho people) if that would work? Greg Kaye 00:23, 2 April 2015 (UTC)
"excellent verifiable content", hey? Want to include my discourse on the confusion over the name "Basotho", or should I try and reword it first? Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:38, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Mark's preceding comment, the page move reversion, and the tone of the conversations here and about Sesotho/ Sotho language (here [1] and here [2]) are serious violations of WP:OWN. The editors on these pages seem to be "tiptoeing" around, "scared" of introducing prefix-less names, for fear of offending the sensibilities of a single (admittedly very valuable) editor, who automatically reverts and responds with personal attacks when other editors try to remove prefixes ( [3] [4] [5]), refuses to even allow changes like "amaZulu" to "Zulu" (despite the fact that community consensus has the relevant article at Zulu), and asserts that he is automatically correct on these issues due to his "privileged first-hand" knowledge, which other users allegedly don't have. For instance, this quote by Zyxoas, "When will these people stop trying to mess around with Sesotho language!?". Where else on WP is such behaviour tolerated, no matter how highly prized the editor's contribution may be?
Mark, your "bribing for the good of the encyclopedia" sounds very much like WP:OWN's "Multiple editors — the involvement of multiple editors, each of which defends the ownership of the other, can be highly complex. The simplest scenario usually comprises a dominant primary editor who is defended by other editors, reinforcing the former's ownership." I'm sure that your intentions are good and you're obviously doing great work on African languages, but nonetheless, this is the net effect of your actions.
Despite this, you're just postponing the inevitable. If it's not resolved now, the prefix issue will be raised again and again, (not necessarily by me), doubtless accompanied by reactions like "this conversation is not really important", and "why do I have such problems getting people to see that they're mistaken and my way is obviously correct". I know that you (Mark) feel that the long argument about naming is counterproductive, and I see your point, but I don't think that's the main issue here, and it certainly doesn't justify the repeated violations of WP policy.
— Batamtig 17:48, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
WP:OWN is not a law one may "violate", but thanks for your valuable input anyway. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 20:55, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
I wasn't going to take up the Sotho/Basotho discussion, but there are two things perhaps to say:
First, it is true that Basotho has been used by a number of writers in recent years (over perhaps the last ?20 years). But my earlier point about exceptions to the general prefixless norm in the Bantu linguistic and research world doesn't apply to Basotho, because there was already a norm that had been established in the two centuries preceding the last 20 years ("Sotho"). So, there is indeed little or no parallel between Basotho and Lingala (where Lingala seems essentially never to have been called simply Ngala in the literature). There is a parallel with Rwanda, which wasn't called Kinyarwanda until this same recent time period.
Second, if the following comment (from some paragraphs above) is in fact from ZyXoas, then this is the second time he has misrepresented what I wrote on the Talk:Sotho_language page. (Must I infer that this is intentional, or just persistently careless?) —
I quote myself, from the Talk:Sotho_language page:
Please desist from misquoting me. It's an intellectually unhelpful way of proceeding.
ZyXoas, you are right: you do not need to know any "entire language" to quote prefixes from that language in English. But then no one claimed you did. This is a straw-man argument. And no, you haven't "convincingly demonstrated" this. You've supplied a number of important aspects to this discussion, and then you've merely claimed your position flatly. Claiming and "convincingly demonstrating" have very distinct thresholds of accountability.
And no, ZyXoas has not rebutted in any substantial way my demonstrated (and demonstrable) claim that you do need to first know [specific information] about the language in question to know which prefix to use for which noun class. You cannot know the shape of a particular prefix (even the common Class 7 language prefix) until you know what that particular language happens to do, because this information doesn't follow from anything (unless you have access to sound shift laws from Proto-Bantu — and even the occurrence of these constitutes language-specific information). So, for the nine Bantu languages in South Africa, the non-speaker of these languages must go and find this specific information and learn it. (And this gets multiplied out by the number of prefixes that are regarded as important to quote in English, typically at least mo-, ba-, and se-).
It strikes me this prefix-frenzy is a kind of pseudo-knowledge that has little of substance to do with Wikipedia's mandate.
While we're at it, demonising the interlocutor in the discussion — "completely false", and again "Does anyone still believe Simon's "prefixes are evil" argument?" — is really not helpful to the discussion. The prefixes used in each Bantu language are utterly crucial to that language (they are just not useful to discussing that language in English!).
"Amen!" to the call to focus on creating more content (more than simply contesting the shape of article title phrases). Cheers — NguniTraveller 01:57, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, Batamtig. I like all the points you've raised here. I may have given the impression of wanting to cut off discussion of the prefix issue, which in a sense I don't (discussion is good), and yet in another sense I do want—like you, and Mark and many others—to reach a principled decision, and then urge that that decision be implemented consistently. In this, again I believe we totally agree. I believe the principles have been laid out quite clearly. I don't know quite who has the authority to act definitively (I don't currently have the level of commitment required to follow up the various protocols). I do think the time for that acting is now.
Yes, people will keep on raising the prefix issue, because it is so "accessible" as an issue (you can SEE the prefixes, or their absence, right away), whereas contentful discussion of and contributions on Bantu languages is much much harder to do. The newcomers who do raise the prefix issue can be referred to WP policy and to the existing discussion histories. If a decision has been taken, then let the relevant WP policy-implementers implement now.
The strength of WP is its "democratic" approach to the presentation of information. One of its stumbling blocks can be the hogging of space and the terrorising of contributors by certain users (sometimes lone users). I totally agree.
I tried to say it in my original comments on Talk:Sotho_language, perhaps not clearly enough: the prefix issue affects ALL uses of a name stem (e.g. Sotho) in another language (e.g. English). AmaZulu and Basotho make as little sense as do IsiZulu and Sesotho. So, my comment about "pseudo-knowledge" extends to all uses of prefixes artificially glued on to stems in the context of non-native discourse (in our case: writing in English about Bantu languages). I called it pseudo-knowledge, because the corollary of needing to know something about a language before knowing the prefix is that one can in fact learn ONLY these prefixes, without knowing anything about the language, and then implicitly or explicitly claim some authority on things Bantu or African, without any real contentful knowledge or contribution.
I think the user who has raised your heckles (and those of many) does have a contentful contribution to make, but that as with all contributions, his contributions need to be within certain boundaries (sometimes where there may be boundaries that he may not like). No biting, no terrorising. Yes to consensus (and its firm subsequent implementation). Amen again.
I think we're seeing eye-to-eye here! Cheers for now, NguniTraveller 16:36, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Now, I don't intend to open a can of worms; I do think we should follow the naming conventions, which prescribe using English names on the English Wikipedia. Hence, we don't have Waswahili but Swahili people; we don't have Ewetowó but Ewe people; we don't have Nederlanders but Dutch people; and tons of other examples.
I fully recognize the important contributions of Zyxoas, the main proponent of Basotho, in precisely this area of Wikipedia; but this doesn't mean he gets to decide unilaterally what the title is to be. Although I highly value his contributions and his good humour, I want to take a stand against the ownership issues he displays now and then.
Sometimes it helps to turn the issue around to get a clearer view. If this page should be titled Basotho, why are the Sotho articles st:Senyesemane and st:Se-jeremane not called Se-English and Se-Deutsch?
But I don't want to replay this debate which by now spans more pages than the constellation of Sotho articles itself. I just want to register my support of the consensus that has been reached in different places and I think it is time to simply enforce the consensus. — mark ✎ 21:01, 25 April 2007 (UTC)
I'm glad that the capitals have gone. Now ditch the double interpunction and we're getting somewhere. ;) Yeah, in some sense, prefixes in English are evil; in the same sense, to be precise, as suffixes in English are evil. Our article on a well known classical language of India isn't located at Saṃskṛtam (heck, not even at Saṃskṛtā) eventhough I don't doubt that much of the scholarly literature uses these names. I do still not see why you would like Basotho/Sesotho to be an exception to our naming conventions. I simply can't see a good reason. And personal preference isn't one, I'm sorry. Neither is the dubious contention that the articles miraculously become a 'festering sack of shit' simply by having a common name. If you have a problem with red links (I don't like them either), remember that redirects are cheap. — mark ✎ 16:58, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
Okay:
"Basotho" seems to be (with the possible exception of the historical "Basuto") to be the most common English name and not "Sotho people." Do you believe otherwise? If this is true will the article be moved back?
If you would care to look at this article's history, (correct me if I'm wrong) you would see that "Basotho people" was the original name of this article. This was a decision reached by Wiki editors before I even knew the article existed. The current confusion stems from User:Dwo's inappropriate move a while ago (another manic cephalophobe). Agree?
"Basotho" was, and still is, the most appropriate name. The malinformed and rash actions of 2 uncooperative trolls with no real interest in this article shouldn't change that for us.
Tebello TheWHO!!?? 17:48, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
According to my good friend Mnr. Google:
I tried to make the 2nd search as useful as possible without including too many "Sotho language" hits, relying on the fact that, due to his relationship with the Cape and Britain, almost all accounts of Basotho mention Moshoeshoe I.
Btw, all this confusion disappears if the names "Basotho" and "Sesotho" are used (many "Sotho people" hits are about the Bapedi and other Northern Basotho peoples, not Basotho) -- so prefixes aren't so EVIL!!!!!111 after all...
Tebello TheWHO!!?? 18:13, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
Oh dude, check this out:
That's without any quotes. The country names are for the fact that if an article speaks of a culture you would also expect it to mention its nation. It's highly likely that an article about Sesotho will briefly mention where it's spoken without reference to the culture, thus the inclusion of "people" to narrow it down just a bit.
Is everyone satisfied (for the next 4 or so months)?
Tebello TheWHO!!?? 18:31, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
For dedicated editors of this page: The "Related Groups" info was removed from all {{ Infobox Ethnic group}} infoboxes. Comments may be left here. Ling.Nut 23:04, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
After reading this page for the first time in 6 months, I realise that the comment I made above at 17:48 could've potentially been misunderstood. The second troll was not Mark but rather the mentally perturbed DawnRetard (who, although he stuck around for longer than the 2 weeks I had initially divined, did eventually quietly disappear in an understated puff of nothing). I apologise for any misunderstanding or offence.
Yes, I moved the article back today. Ultimately, apparent trends should not be interpreted as absolute rules by default. I realise that Google tests do have their problems and I did try my best to make the results as relevant as possibly (even with the problems, there is still a stark and conclusive difference between the negative and affirmative results). I have waited patiently for half a year for a discussion which never came.
Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 20:57, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Well, this should be obvious, but at risk of insulting your intelligence I'll tell you anyway. The articles were being vandalised by DawnTrebuchet; DT has since moved on to a happier place; thus the vandalism has stopped. Of course, when he WAS around, very little was done to stop his vandalism and his personal attacks (which I'm still very disappointed about -- but I've moved on) and a disproportionate amount of energy was invested in arguing about the titles of articles which had basically become useless (of course, this wouldn't have been the first or last argument like that on Wikipedia).
At risk of insulting you even further: I feel that simply ignoring and not even commenting once on my Google tests (which I gave you at least two opportunities above to do for yourself before I did them) suggests to me a type of intellectual dishonesty wrt this matter. It's okay though -- I'm happy with the eventual result but I'm not happy with how it happened.
Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 08:49, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
As can be seen from looking at
Sotho, the 84% you cite needs to be divided between at least 3 uses (yes, I know this is terribly unscientific, but you suggested it).
While we are still indulging ourselves in pseudoscience, note the following:
Sotho -language -languages. 600 000 hits.
The first 2 hits are from sotho.blogsme, a Sesotho poetry site The 3rd hit is for a dictionary The 4th and 5th are translations of Silent Night into Sesotho and Northern Sotho The 6th is another dictionary The 7th is a Sesotho translation of the Basic Conditions of Employment Act The 8th is another dictionary The 9th and final hit on the first page is the first one that actually talks about the people |
My most basic plea is this: since it is basically impossible to prove either view conclusively and scientifically, let us follow the growing English trend of using the native names when non-native varieties are not sufficiently well-established. It's the liberal thing to do!! :-D
Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 11:38, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Okay, dude. But liberalism is the new fashion! Some of my best friends are (self-proclaimed) Bantus (like Ezeu)!! I don't have a problem with these people and there are a few of them who are very intelligent and not like the rest of them...
Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 14:16, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Are we saying that without Moshoeshoe there would be no Sotho people? That's what the intro says. Garibaldi unitted the Italaians, Bismark united the Germans, but I've never heard it said that they created such nations. I think this needs toning down. With or without Moshoeshoe there WOULD have been Sotho people. Rui ''Gabriel'' Correia ( talk) 14:33, 24 February 2014 (UTC)
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This article is rated Start-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Hello,
WikiProject Ethnic groups has added new assessment criteria for Ethnic Groups articles.
I rated the Basotho) article: Start-Class, with the following comments (see link to ratings summary page in the Ethnic groups template atop this talk page):
You can give this article (and any other article within the WikiProject) a rating, as described below.
Revisions of assessment ratings can be made by assigning an appropriate value via the class parameter in the WikiProject Ethnic groups project banner {{ Ethnic groups}} that is currently placed at the top of Ethnic groups articles' talk pages. Quality assessment guidelines are at the Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team's assessment system page. After rating the article, please provide a short summary to explain your ratings and/or identify the strengths and weaknesses. To add the summary, please edit this article's ratings summary page. A link to this page can be found in the {{ Ethnic groups}} template on the article's talk page.
Please see the Project's article rating and assessment scheme for more information and the details and criteria for each rating value. A brief version can be found at Template talk:Ethnic groups. You can also enquire at the Ethnic groups Project's main discussion board for assistance.
Another way to help out that could be an enjoyable pastime is to visit Category:Unassessed Ethnic groups articles, find an interesting-looking article to read, and carefully assess it following those guidelines.
Thanks!
--
Ling.Nut
14:11, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
At Zyxoas's request I'm copying relevant portions of a discussion we were having on my talk page to here. — mark ✎ 16:40, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
Let me try this 1 more time. What's you view, exactly? That:
If you follow the first view then the article should be at Basotho, since this is the most common name used when talking about the history of Lesotho, South Africa, and Great Britain; both here on Wikipedia ( Lesotho, Moshoeshoe I) and in books I've read (eg Google for "Hill of Destiny") and TV programs I've seen etc. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 10:26, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
There was no general consensus among editors that Basotho should've been moved to Sotho people, nor was there a need to implement "standardisation" as Wikipedia has survived thus far without there ever being a need to "standardise" any article names since that would mean changing the generally accepted names -- contrary to popular opinion.
This should have been discussed first, and I believe that had it been then there would not have been a move.
This is unnecessary and misinformed and should be undone. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 17:47, 19 December 2006 (UTC)
There's no reason to indiscriminately remove prefixes. Simon's argument that one needs to know the entire language to use names with prefixes is completely false -- and I believe that I've convincingly demonstrated this. One doesn't need to understand the grammar and morphology of various foreign words to use them (and, in the case of French, even pronounce them using vowels, consonants, pronunciations which don't exist/make sense in English).
Basotho is a VERY common name, and the initial move was unnecessary and misinformed and should be undone. Had this been discussed before, I believe that the move wouldn't have been agreed upon, and it's strange that I now have to try so hard to get this simple mistake corrected. The fact that the article has already been moved does not magically give the pro-"Sotho people" arguments any more weight and validity than they would've had before. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 08:51, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
The typical English speaker need only type in " Sotho" where they'll be taken to a dab linking to Sesotho language and Basotho (no, the fact that Zulu etc redirect to the language is not really a good reason for not making Sotho a dab).
Of course, none of us here (with one possibly exception) qualifies as "a typical English speaker"... Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Maasai and Kinyarwanda language are two accepted exceptions to the prefix-less view. I wonder what the "typical English speaker" thinks of that... Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:44, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Of course, none of us here (with one possibly exception) qualifies as "a typical English speaker"... Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Maasai and Kinyarwanda language are two accepted exceptions to the prefix-less view. I wonder what the "typical English speaker" thinks of that... Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:44, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
I've sort of dealt with a similar issue at Talk:Ubuntu and Talk:Ubuntu (ideology). This is intended to (eventually, someday, perhaps) be an encyclopedia of World knowledge, not simply a reflection of the naturally limited knowledge of first language speakers of English.
So Ubuntu is a dab linking to both the ideology and the the Linux distribution, even though 1 out of every 137,85 people typing in "Ubuntu" would be looking info on the O.S.
There was nothing profoundly incorrect with the previous situation where the article was @ Basotho, and the move should be undone. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 17:27, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
I used that example to show that we probably sometimes shouldn't give so much weight to what this fabled "typical English speaker" may or may not be thinking. Also, the sensoo why I offered the counterexamples with Kinyarwanda etc is to show that the "this is what every other article is like" argument is not awfully valid.
Does anyone still believe Simon's "prefixes are evil" argument? Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 20:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Of course, in my last comment "sensoo" should've been "reason", and 1 person would be looking for the ideology, not the O.S. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 21:35, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Can I suggest the title Basotho (the Sotho people) if that would work? Greg Kaye 00:23, 2 April 2015 (UTC)
"excellent verifiable content", hey? Want to include my discourse on the confusion over the name "Basotho", or should I try and reword it first? Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 12:38, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Mark's preceding comment, the page move reversion, and the tone of the conversations here and about Sesotho/ Sotho language (here [1] and here [2]) are serious violations of WP:OWN. The editors on these pages seem to be "tiptoeing" around, "scared" of introducing prefix-less names, for fear of offending the sensibilities of a single (admittedly very valuable) editor, who automatically reverts and responds with personal attacks when other editors try to remove prefixes ( [3] [4] [5]), refuses to even allow changes like "amaZulu" to "Zulu" (despite the fact that community consensus has the relevant article at Zulu), and asserts that he is automatically correct on these issues due to his "privileged first-hand" knowledge, which other users allegedly don't have. For instance, this quote by Zyxoas, "When will these people stop trying to mess around with Sesotho language!?". Where else on WP is such behaviour tolerated, no matter how highly prized the editor's contribution may be?
Mark, your "bribing for the good of the encyclopedia" sounds very much like WP:OWN's "Multiple editors — the involvement of multiple editors, each of which defends the ownership of the other, can be highly complex. The simplest scenario usually comprises a dominant primary editor who is defended by other editors, reinforcing the former's ownership." I'm sure that your intentions are good and you're obviously doing great work on African languages, but nonetheless, this is the net effect of your actions.
Despite this, you're just postponing the inevitable. If it's not resolved now, the prefix issue will be raised again and again, (not necessarily by me), doubtless accompanied by reactions like "this conversation is not really important", and "why do I have such problems getting people to see that they're mistaken and my way is obviously correct". I know that you (Mark) feel that the long argument about naming is counterproductive, and I see your point, but I don't think that's the main issue here, and it certainly doesn't justify the repeated violations of WP policy.
— Batamtig 17:48, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
WP:OWN is not a law one may "violate", but thanks for your valuable input anyway. Zyxoas ( talk to me - I'll listen) 20:55, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
I wasn't going to take up the Sotho/Basotho discussion, but there are two things perhaps to say:
First, it is true that Basotho has been used by a number of writers in recent years (over perhaps the last ?20 years). But my earlier point about exceptions to the general prefixless norm in the Bantu linguistic and research world doesn't apply to Basotho, because there was already a norm that had been established in the two centuries preceding the last 20 years ("Sotho"). So, there is indeed little or no parallel between Basotho and Lingala (where Lingala seems essentially never to have been called simply Ngala in the literature). There is a parallel with Rwanda, which wasn't called Kinyarwanda until this same recent time period.
Second, if the following comment (from some paragraphs above) is in fact from ZyXoas, then this is the second time he has misrepresented what I wrote on the Talk:Sotho_language page. (Must I infer that this is intentional, or just persistently careless?) —
I quote myself, from the Talk:Sotho_language page:
Please desist from misquoting me. It's an intellectually unhelpful way of proceeding.
ZyXoas, you are right: you do not need to know any "entire language" to quote prefixes from that language in English. But then no one claimed you did. This is a straw-man argument. And no, you haven't "convincingly demonstrated" this. You've supplied a number of important aspects to this discussion, and then you've merely claimed your position flatly. Claiming and "convincingly demonstrating" have very distinct thresholds of accountability.
And no, ZyXoas has not rebutted in any substantial way my demonstrated (and demonstrable) claim that you do need to first know [specific information] about the language in question to know which prefix to use for which noun class. You cannot know the shape of a particular prefix (even the common Class 7 language prefix) until you know what that particular language happens to do, because this information doesn't follow from anything (unless you have access to sound shift laws from Proto-Bantu — and even the occurrence of these constitutes language-specific information). So, for the nine Bantu languages in South Africa, the non-speaker of these languages must go and find this specific information and learn it. (And this gets multiplied out by the number of prefixes that are regarded as important to quote in English, typically at least mo-, ba-, and se-).
It strikes me this prefix-frenzy is a kind of pseudo-knowledge that has little of substance to do with Wikipedia's mandate.
While we're at it, demonising the interlocutor in the discussion — "completely false", and again "Does anyone still believe Simon's "prefixes are evil" argument?" — is really not helpful to the discussion. The prefixes used in each Bantu language are utterly crucial to that language (they are just not useful to discussing that language in English!).
"Amen!" to the call to focus on creating more content (more than simply contesting the shape of article title phrases). Cheers — NguniTraveller 01:57, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, Batamtig. I like all the points you've raised here. I may have given the impression of wanting to cut off discussion of the prefix issue, which in a sense I don't (discussion is good), and yet in another sense I do want—like you, and Mark and many others—to reach a principled decision, and then urge that that decision be implemented consistently. In this, again I believe we totally agree. I believe the principles have been laid out quite clearly. I don't know quite who has the authority to act definitively (I don't currently have the level of commitment required to follow up the various protocols). I do think the time for that acting is now.
Yes, people will keep on raising the prefix issue, because it is so "accessible" as an issue (you can SEE the prefixes, or their absence, right away), whereas contentful discussion of and contributions on Bantu languages is much much harder to do. The newcomers who do raise the prefix issue can be referred to WP policy and to the existing discussion histories. If a decision has been taken, then let the relevant WP policy-implementers implement now.
The strength of WP is its "democratic" approach to the presentation of information. One of its stumbling blocks can be the hogging of space and the terrorising of contributors by certain users (sometimes lone users). I totally agree.
I tried to say it in my original comments on Talk:Sotho_language, perhaps not clearly enough: the prefix issue affects ALL uses of a name stem (e.g. Sotho) in another language (e.g. English). AmaZulu and Basotho make as little sense as do IsiZulu and Sesotho. So, my comment about "pseudo-knowledge" extends to all uses of prefixes artificially glued on to stems in the context of non-native discourse (in our case: writing in English about Bantu languages). I called it pseudo-knowledge, because the corollary of needing to know something about a language before knowing the prefix is that one can in fact learn ONLY these prefixes, without knowing anything about the language, and then implicitly or explicitly claim some authority on things Bantu or African, without any real contentful knowledge or contribution.
I think the user who has raised your heckles (and those of many) does have a contentful contribution to make, but that as with all contributions, his contributions need to be within certain boundaries (sometimes where there may be boundaries that he may not like). No biting, no terrorising. Yes to consensus (and its firm subsequent implementation). Amen again.
I think we're seeing eye-to-eye here! Cheers for now, NguniTraveller 16:36, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
Now, I don't intend to open a can of worms; I do think we should follow the naming conventions, which prescribe using English names on the English Wikipedia. Hence, we don't have Waswahili but Swahili people; we don't have Ewetowó but Ewe people; we don't have Nederlanders but Dutch people; and tons of other examples.
I fully recognize the important contributions of Zyxoas, the main proponent of Basotho, in precisely this area of Wikipedia; but this doesn't mean he gets to decide unilaterally what the title is to be. Although I highly value his contributions and his good humour, I want to take a stand against the ownership issues he displays now and then.
Sometimes it helps to turn the issue around to get a clearer view. If this page should be titled Basotho, why are the Sotho articles st:Senyesemane and st:Se-jeremane not called Se-English and Se-Deutsch?
But I don't want to replay this debate which by now spans more pages than the constellation of Sotho articles itself. I just want to register my support of the consensus that has been reached in different places and I think it is time to simply enforce the consensus. — mark ✎ 21:01, 25 April 2007 (UTC)
I'm glad that the capitals have gone. Now ditch the double interpunction and we're getting somewhere. ;) Yeah, in some sense, prefixes in English are evil; in the same sense, to be precise, as suffixes in English are evil. Our article on a well known classical language of India isn't located at Saṃskṛtam (heck, not even at Saṃskṛtā) eventhough I don't doubt that much of the scholarly literature uses these names. I do still not see why you would like Basotho/Sesotho to be an exception to our naming conventions. I simply can't see a good reason. And personal preference isn't one, I'm sorry. Neither is the dubious contention that the articles miraculously become a 'festering sack of shit' simply by having a common name. If you have a problem with red links (I don't like them either), remember that redirects are cheap. — mark ✎ 16:58, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
Okay:
"Basotho" seems to be (with the possible exception of the historical "Basuto") to be the most common English name and not "Sotho people." Do you believe otherwise? If this is true will the article be moved back?
If you would care to look at this article's history, (correct me if I'm wrong) you would see that "Basotho people" was the original name of this article. This was a decision reached by Wiki editors before I even knew the article existed. The current confusion stems from User:Dwo's inappropriate move a while ago (another manic cephalophobe). Agree?
"Basotho" was, and still is, the most appropriate name. The malinformed and rash actions of 2 uncooperative trolls with no real interest in this article shouldn't change that for us.
Tebello TheWHO!!?? 17:48, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
According to my good friend Mnr. Google:
I tried to make the 2nd search as useful as possible without including too many "Sotho language" hits, relying on the fact that, due to his relationship with the Cape and Britain, almost all accounts of Basotho mention Moshoeshoe I.
Btw, all this confusion disappears if the names "Basotho" and "Sesotho" are used (many "Sotho people" hits are about the Bapedi and other Northern Basotho peoples, not Basotho) -- so prefixes aren't so EVIL!!!!!111 after all...
Tebello TheWHO!!?? 18:13, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
Oh dude, check this out:
That's without any quotes. The country names are for the fact that if an article speaks of a culture you would also expect it to mention its nation. It's highly likely that an article about Sesotho will briefly mention where it's spoken without reference to the culture, thus the inclusion of "people" to narrow it down just a bit.
Is everyone satisfied (for the next 4 or so months)?
Tebello TheWHO!!?? 18:31, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
For dedicated editors of this page: The "Related Groups" info was removed from all {{ Infobox Ethnic group}} infoboxes. Comments may be left here. Ling.Nut 23:04, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
After reading this page for the first time in 6 months, I realise that the comment I made above at 17:48 could've potentially been misunderstood. The second troll was not Mark but rather the mentally perturbed DawnRetard (who, although he stuck around for longer than the 2 weeks I had initially divined, did eventually quietly disappear in an understated puff of nothing). I apologise for any misunderstanding or offence.
Yes, I moved the article back today. Ultimately, apparent trends should not be interpreted as absolute rules by default. I realise that Google tests do have their problems and I did try my best to make the results as relevant as possibly (even with the problems, there is still a stark and conclusive difference between the negative and affirmative results). I have waited patiently for half a year for a discussion which never came.
Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 20:57, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Well, this should be obvious, but at risk of insulting your intelligence I'll tell you anyway. The articles were being vandalised by DawnTrebuchet; DT has since moved on to a happier place; thus the vandalism has stopped. Of course, when he WAS around, very little was done to stop his vandalism and his personal attacks (which I'm still very disappointed about -- but I've moved on) and a disproportionate amount of energy was invested in arguing about the titles of articles which had basically become useless (of course, this wouldn't have been the first or last argument like that on Wikipedia).
At risk of insulting you even further: I feel that simply ignoring and not even commenting once on my Google tests (which I gave you at least two opportunities above to do for yourself before I did them) suggests to me a type of intellectual dishonesty wrt this matter. It's okay though -- I'm happy with the eventual result but I'm not happy with how it happened.
Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 08:49, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
As can be seen from looking at
Sotho, the 84% you cite needs to be divided between at least 3 uses (yes, I know this is terribly unscientific, but you suggested it).
While we are still indulging ourselves in pseudoscience, note the following:
Sotho -language -languages. 600 000 hits.
The first 2 hits are from sotho.blogsme, a Sesotho poetry site The 3rd hit is for a dictionary The 4th and 5th are translations of Silent Night into Sesotho and Northern Sotho The 6th is another dictionary The 7th is a Sesotho translation of the Basic Conditions of Employment Act The 8th is another dictionary The 9th and final hit on the first page is the first one that actually talks about the people |
My most basic plea is this: since it is basically impossible to prove either view conclusively and scientifically, let us follow the growing English trend of using the native names when non-native varieties are not sufficiently well-established. It's the liberal thing to do!! :-D
Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 11:38, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Okay, dude. But liberalism is the new fashion! Some of my best friends are (self-proclaimed) Bantus (like Ezeu)!! I don't have a problem with these people and there are a few of them who are very intelligent and not like the rest of them...
Tebello TheWHAT!!?? 14:16, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
Are we saying that without Moshoeshoe there would be no Sotho people? That's what the intro says. Garibaldi unitted the Italaians, Bismark united the Germans, but I've never heard it said that they created such nations. I think this needs toning down. With or without Moshoeshoe there WOULD have been Sotho people. Rui ''Gabriel'' Correia ( talk) 14:33, 24 February 2014 (UTC)
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